Print cartridges with one-piece printhead supports

Abstract

In some examples, a print cartridge includes a housing, a one-piece printhead support attached to the housing, a printhead supported on a head-land surface area, and a trench in the printhead support surrounding the head-land surface area on at least two sides.

Description

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION[0001]This is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 15 / 022,156, filed Mar. 15, 2016, which is a national stage application under 35 U.S.C. §371 of PCT / US2013 / 061511, filed Sep. 25, 2013, which are both hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety.BACKGROUND[0002]Conventional inkjet print cartridges, or pens, include a printhead assembly and ink supply assembly integrated within a monolithic housing that simplifies the replacement of ink supplies for inkjet printers. The printhead assembly supports a printhead die adhered to a carrier substrate, or chiclet. Thus, the chiclet serves as a printhead die support platform as well as a fluid distribution manifold to distribute ink from the ink supply assembly to ink feed slots in the die. In general, the chiclet is adhered to a base component, which in turn, is adhered to a housing of the ink supply assembly. Because the chiclet serves as a support platform for the printhead die, it is impo...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The patent text describes a problem in the fabrication of inkjet print cartridges where the challenge of joining together various components that support a printhead die and facilitate the flow of ink to the die from an ink supply assembly can result in inaccurate orientation and poor surface planarity of the printhead die. This can lead to print quality problems and other issues associated with the resulting orientation of the printhead die to the print media. In addition, differences in the material makeup of the joined components can cause problems in the printhead assembly such as a failure of the printhead die due to thermal cycling events. The patent text proposes a solution in the form of a molded, one-piece printhead support that eliminates inaccuracies in orientation and reduces the likelihood of failure of the printhead assembly.

Problems solved by technology

However, the chiclet, the base, and other assembly components, each have six degrees of freedom in free space, which presents a significant challenge when trying to properly align and adhere these components to one another during fabrication.

Therefore, thermal excursions encountered during fabrication, testing, and shipping, create stresses between the chiclet and base that in turn can stress and fracture the printhead die adhered to the chiclet.

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